Sunday, September 4, 2016

SpaceX accident bad news for space industry, including Canada

That's what happened to a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket last Thursday at Cape Canaveral's Space Launch Complex 40. The company was preparing for a launch of AMOS-6, a satellite from Israeli company Spacecom, when the accident occurred.

Here's a roundup of relevant stories about the incident and the effect it could have on the space industry, including upcoming Canadian launches.

SpaceX will pay a price for what happened. They lost a rocket and a payload, the launch pad was damaged (how much damage is unknown at this time), and their reputation for reliability has taken a hit. At this point they must be hoping that the investigation shows the problem was with the launch pad and not the rocket.

But SpaceX isn’t the only one taking a hit. Their commercial customers are, too.

Other SpaceX customers, like Iridium Satellite Communications of McLean, Virginia, and SES of Luxembourg, may need to put a hold on planned launches. Eutelsat Communications of Paris said in a press release that they’ll lose up to US$56 million in revenue due to the satellite’s loss.

Also potentially affected are SpaceX launches for NASA, including cargo runs to the International Space Station (ISS), and NASA’s commercial crew program. SpaceX was one of the 2 companies selected to take astronauts to the ISS in 2018.

According to Berger, SpaceX gets up to 85% of its revenue from NASA, and that's where the company should focus its attention.

OldSpace companies like United Launch Alliance and Ariane have been criticized for not changing their ways fast enough. Maybe they're moving slower because they learned something from their own early problems.

And maybe newcomers to the launch industry should pay closer attention to the lessons the old hands learned the hard way.